MADAGASCAR: Independence, the First Republic, and the Military Transition, 1960-75

The following is excerped from the Country Studies--Area Handbook program of the U.S. Department of the Army. The original version of this text is available at the Library of Congress.
Full index of Country Studies-Madagascar

Madagascar

Independence, the First Republic, and the Military Transition, 1960-75

View of Antananarivo from the Royal HillCourtesy Brian Kensley

After France adopted the Constitution of the Fifth
Republic
under the leadership of General Charles de Gaulle, on
September
28, 1958, Madagascar held a referendum to determine
whether the
country should become a self-governing republic within the
French
community. The AKFM and other nationalists opposed to the
concept
of limited self-rule mustered about 25 percent of votes
cast. The
vast majority of the population at the urging of the PSD
leadership voted in favor of the referendum. The vote led
to the
election of Tsiranana as the country's first president on
April
27, 1959. After a year of negotiations between Tsiranana
and his
French counterparts, Madagascar's status as a
self-governing
republic officially was altered on June 26, 1960, to that
of a
fully independent and sovereign state. The cornerstone of
Tsiranana's government was the signing with France of
fourteen
agreements and conventions designed to maintain and
strengthen
Franco-Malagasy ties. These agreements were to provide the
basis
for increasing opposition from Tsiranana's critics.

A spirit of political reconciliation prevailed in the
early
1960s. By achieving independence and obtaining the release
of the
MDRM leaders detained since the Revolt of 1947, Tsiranana
had coopted the chief issues on which the more aggressively
nationalist
elements had built much of their support. Consistent with
Tsiranana's firm commitment to remain attached to Western
civilization, the new regime made plain its intent to
maintain
strong ties to France and the West in the economic,
defense, and
cultural spheres. Not entirely sanguine about this
prospect, the
opposition initially concurred in the interest of
consolidating
the gains of the previous decade, and most ethnic and
regional
interests supported Tsiranana.

Similar to other African leaders during the immediate
independence era, Tsiranana oversaw the consolidation of
his own
party's power at the expense of other parties. A political
system
that strongly favored the incumbent complemented these
actions.
For example, although the political process allowed
minority
parties to participate, the constitution mandated a
winner-take-
all system that effectively denied the opposition a voice
in
governance. Tsiranana's position was further strengthened
by the
broad, multiethnic popular base of the PSD among the
côtiers, whereas the opposition was severely
disorganized.
The AKFM continued to experience intraparty rifts between
leftist
and ultranationalist, more orthodox Marxist factions; it
was
unable to capitalize on increasingly active but relatively
less
privileged Malagasy youth because the party's base was the
Merina
middle class.

A new force on the political scene provided the first
serious
challenge to the Tsiranana government in April 1971. The
National
Movement for the Independence of Madagascar (Mouvement
National
pour l'Indépendance de Madagascar--Monima) led a peasant
uprising
in Toliara Province. The creator and leader of Monima was
Monja
Jaona, a côtier from the south who also
participated in
the Revolt of 1947. The main issue was government pressure
for
tax collection at a time when local cattle herds were
being
ravaged by disease. The protesters attacked military and
administrative centers in the area, apparently hoping for
support
in the form of weapons and reinforcements from China. Such
help
never arrived, and the revolt was harshly and quickly
suppressed.
An estimated fifty to 1,000 persons died, Monima was
dissolved,
and Monima leaders, including Jaona and several hundred
protesters, were arrested and deported to the island of
Nosy
Lava.

Another movement came on the scene in early 1972, in
the form
of student protests in Antananarivo. A general strike
involving
the nation's roughly 100,000 secondary-level students
focused on
three principal issues: ending the cultural cooperation
agreements with France; replacing educational programs
designed
for schools in France and taught by French teachers with
programs
emphasizing Malagasy life and culture and taught by
Malagasy
instructors; and increasing access for economically
underprivileged youth to secondary-level institutions. By
early
May, the PSD sought to end the student strike at any cost;
on May
12 and 13, the government arrested several hundred student
leaders and sent them to Nosy-Lava. Authorities also
closed the
schools and banned demonstrations.

Mounting economic stagnation--as revealed in scarcities
of
investment capital, a general decline in living standards,
and
the failure to meet even modest development goals--further
undermined the government's position. Forces unleashed by
the
growing economic crisis combined with student unrest to
create an
opposition alliance. Workers, public servants, peasants,
and many
unemployed urban youth of Antananarivo joined the student
strike,
which spread to the provinces. Protesters set fire to the
town
hall and to the offices of a French-language newspaper in
the
capital.

The turning point occurred on May 13 when the
Republican
Security Force (Force Républicaine de Sécurité--FRS)
opened fire
on the rioters; in the ensuing melee between fifteen and
forty
persons were killed and about 150 injured. Tsiranana
declared a
state of national emergency and on May 18 dissolved his
government, effectively ending the First Republic. He then
turned
over full power to the National Army under the command of
General
Gabriel Ramanantsoa, a politically conservative Merina and
former
career officer in the French army. The National Army had
maintained strict political neutrality in the crisis, and
its
intervention to restore order was welcomed by protesters
and
opposition elements.

The Ramanantsoa military regime could not resolve
rising
economic and ethnic problems, and narrowly survived an
attempted
coup d'état on December 31, 1974. The fact that the coup
was led
by several côtier officers against a Merina
military
leader underscored the growing Merina/côtier
polarization
in the military. In an attempt at restoring unity,
Ramanantsoa,
on February 5, 1975, turned over power to Colonel Richard
Ratsimandrava (a Merina with a less "aristocratic"
background).
Five days later, Ratsimandrava was assassinated, and a
National
Military Directorate was formed to restore order by
declaring
martial law, strictly censoring political expression, and
suspending all political parties.

The political transition crisis was resolved on June
15,
1975, when the National Military Directorate selected
Lieutenant
Commander Didier Ratsiraka as head of state and president
of a
new ruling body, the Supreme Revolutionary Council (SRC).
The
choice of Ratsiraka allayed ethnic concerns because he was
a
côtier belonging to the Betsimisaraka ethnic group.
In
addition, Ratsiraka--a dedicated socialist--was perceived
by his
military peers as a consensus candidate capable of forging
unity
among the various leftist political parties (such as AKFM
and
Monima), students, urban workers, the peasantry, and the
armed
forces.